Rebecca Connor, LMFT

Upcoming line Logistics line Couples line Women

Upcoming Retreats

Schedule of upcoming retreats held at The Christine Center in Willard, Wisconsin or at Cobblestone Cabins, in Tofte, Minnesota.

Ongoing
HALF-DAY COUPLES INTENSIVES
3507 Lyndale Avenue South in South Minneapolis, lower level
Intensives are held about once a month or as soon as we have two paid couples.

Please call (612) 877-1081 to reserve and for more information.
Cost: $200 per couple, or $100 per person.

[ More information ]

COUPLES SKILLS RETREAT
The Christine Center in Willard, Wisconsin
Dates: tbd

2012
WOMEN'S SOLSTICE RETREAT
The Christine Center in Willard, Wisconsin

[ Download the Retreat Flier ]

Dates: June 22-24, 2012

Retreat Logistics

Location
Retreats are located at The Christine Center or Cobblestone Cabins.

Christine Center

Schedule
At the Christine Center, the weekend begins with a Friday night meeting from 7 to 9pm, then generally meets for a total of 6 hours over a morning and afternoon session on Saturday, and ends on Sunday at the 11am brunch after a 2-hour morning session.

Lodging
Lodging is available on a first-pay basis.

Early payment secures your place in a modern cabin, rustic cabin, or modern room.

Cabins are located in the woods and tend to be roomy and private. Rustic cabins have no running water, but do have heat and electricity, and some have word-burning stoves and a porto-potty. There is easy access to the Siloe, a room with showers, lockers and toilets.

Women will usually have a roommate but can pay an additional $100 for a private room.

Couples have private rooms or cabins together.

Cost
Retreat pricing is $400 per person,

Cost includes all lodging, 3 meals on Saturday, and 2 meals on Sunday.

Friday meals are not included and require an additional fee of $10 to be paid directly to the center.

We keep our overhead low to provide an excellent value with minimal mark-up.

Massages
Massages are available directly through the massage therapists who live at the center. Call Mary at 715-267-4715 at 715-267-6389 or Roberta at 715-267-6389 for scheduling.

It is important that you make sure not to schedule massages during scheduled session times.

Visit christinecenter.org for more information.

Cobblestone Cabin

Schedule
At Cobblestone Cabins, we begin 7pm Thursday night and end at 10am Sunday morning. Hours will vary for retreats at this location, but generally there will be about 6 hours of retreat time on Friday and Saturday and about an hour or more Sunday morning.

Lodging and Cost
I prepay for two large cabins that can sleep 4-6 people about 9 months ahead of the retreat. Sometimes women choose to rent their own cabin separately. I require full, non-refundable payment to hold your place. You can send $395 per person to Rebecca Connor, 3507 Lyndale Avenue S., Minneapolis, MN 55441.

This retreat will fill up and early prepayment is highly recommended. If you need to cancel, you can get a refund if I or you can find someone to take your place. If you get your own cabin, it is recommended that you do so the November before if possible. Cobblestone is closed from November through May and they tend to fill up quickly. I have a main chef and an assistant and the rest of us will help with cleanup and preparation as needed. This part will likely be fairly minimal.

Retreats for Couples

This retreat is designed to help couples to explore old patterns from new perspectives of curiosity, inquiry, compassion and understanding.

We will practice ways to deepen your presence with yourself and with your loved one in a nonjudgmental and creative way.

Focus is on the couple over the group experience. Couples have opportunities for private guidance and coaching.

Couples will learn specific listening and expressing techniques to help one another to stay on the same side in times of conflict.

We will explore perspectives of how to jump out of old habitual systems, power struggles and into developing new muscles of empathy and change.

You will have handouts for your cognitive mind and exercises and practice for putting concepts into practice.

The intention of these retreats is to find ways to stay connected and partnered through good times as well as times of conflict and anger, as well as to revitalize the love and connection that keeps you together.

Workshops are highly experiential and focus is on your work with your partner. Exercises are designed to guide self-reflection and empathy and you will be guided to practice and oscillating focus from your partner back to yourself . We will discuss concepts as a group, and then couples will practice exercises designed to ground the concepts into basic communication and connection.

Half-Day Couples Intensive

About once a month on a Saturday or Sunday morning from 10am to 2pm, Rebecca and Terry lead Couples Intensives at Rebecca’s office located at 3507 Lyndale Avenue South, in South Minneapolis, Lower Level.

These 4-hour morning workshops are limited to 2 couples. The first half of the time is working together through a hand out to guide in managing conflict and staying connected with one another.

During the second half of the workshop, each couple with break away into a separate space with one of the facilitators to work with a stuck place in the relationship or whatever each individual of the couple chooses to work with in an experiential exercise of active listening and mindfulness.

Retreat Leaders

Rebecca leads the couples' retreat, and her husband Terry assists.

Workshops and Retreats are highly experiential. There is much practice on real issues and challenges as well as time to remember and revitalize what keeps couples bonded and together.

Rebecca and Terry have both been involved with significant trainings in relationship and communication, as well as emotional developmental and attachmenttrainings. Rebecca and Terry have been together since 1993 and done much work together on their own communication and bonding challenges.

Rebecca and Terry have worked together in holding workshops and retreats for couples since shortly after returning to the Twin Cities in 1999.

Quotes from Previous Retreats

"Words do not describe what I am walking away with. I am leaving with a new attitude."

"Excellent, very powerful. We highly recommend it."

"What a great experience. I could use a retreat like this every few months to remind myself how important my relationship and my wife are."

“This was an opportunity to stop, focus, breathe, talk and make some plans and dreams together about our future onto more of a concrete map.”

“This workshop has given my wife and I the tools we need to work through our conflicts in a respectful and positive way so that we can continue to deepen our relationship.”

“I love the handout and I loved the group of participants, they were all powerful teachers, and Rebecca and Terry’s guidance was crucial. I had an insight and made a commitment this weekend that will change the way I am with the people I love. Thank you so much.”

“I was able to tap into things in both myself and my partner that I had only vague glimpses of prior to this workshop.”

“The opportunity to look at one’s hard issues with guidance and space was a precious occasion.”

“I feel more hopeful than I have for a long time that I can actually be involved in a genuine relationship.”

Retreats for Women

Each women's retreat has a particular theme and varies in focus and content. The intent of the women’s retreats is to deepen and expand the resource of our creative connections with ourselves and with one another.

Workshops are highly experiential and include exercises and rituals designed to guide participants toward setting genuine life intentions as well as exploring, clearing and updating patterns and themes that no longer serve us.

We actively practice aligning conscious intention to create authentic and lasting change, growth and evolution. Exercises are designed to guide us to set intentions that match up compassionately and accurately with where we truly are in our lives. Many of us run into blocks when we attempt to objectify and change ourselves through old painful and conditioned patterns of perfectionism rather than through compassion and creativity.

Retreats include self-reflective and witnessing activities such as vision quests, a creative project of some kind and other creative spiritually-based exercises.

Quotes from Previous Retreats

"I was surprised at the depth achieved with other women and how individual depths were explored with such care."

"Beyond wonderful. I especially enjoyed spending time with other women around the fire after the workshop."

"Thank you, I needed this time, this space, this work. I so enjoyed the group and your leadership "